Would You Want To Meet Your Birth Mother?
I was born in August 1952 in Falkirk, Scotland. The story I was told by my adoptive mother — and I have no idea where she got it from — was that I was the result of a liaison between a married woman and a family friend while her husband was away on Army duty.
When the husband returned — whether before or after I was born I do not know — he made it clear that either she went or the baby did, so I was put up for adoption.
Being adopted
The policy at that time was that adoptees should be sent as far away from their birthplace as was practical, so that there was little chance of later communication, leading to accidental incest between siblings. I therefore spent some time in a children’s home in Gosport, on the south coast of England, before being adopted by a family in Poole, not far along the coast in Dorset, which is where I grew up.It does not take an adopted child long to realise that there is something unusual about him or her. For me, it was the difference between how family friends and acquaintances treated me as opposed to my sister — my parents’ “natural” daughter who was eight years older than me.
There was no “I can see where you get your hair/eyes/anything else from” with me as there was with my sister. That was hardly surprising, given that I was tall, fair-haired and blue-eyed, whereas the rest of the family were short, dark-haired and brown-eyed!
I also knew that I had been born in Scotland, but my parents had never lived in Scotland. When I asked them about this, they let me know about my status as an adoptee. I also found an entry in my uncle’s diary for 1953 which read “Baby John (birth name Clayton) arrived”.Curiosity
As I got older I became more curious about my origins, but it was not until I was married (at age 25) and away from home that I did anything about it. With the knowledge of my birth name and date, and town of birth, I was able to apply for a copy of my original birth certificate.
When this arrived, I was delighted to see that mine was a home birth, and the certificate gave the actual address, as well as the…
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